The kulaks are revolting - does Urban back big farmer?

[ouirdeaux]

I've always found refering to yourself in the third person a very strange affectation.

She has as well.

 

[Funky_monks]

It's a big question, isn't it, How should we farm? FWIW my idea for that is that we need more hyper-intensive systems, such as salad crops grown in vertical farms, combined with extremely extensive farming systems in which, for example, livestock roam through semi-wooded areas. So that term 'productive land' hides a huge range of possibilities.

I'm not mad keen on vertical farming in that sense, it always seems to claim to be "environmentally friendly" whilst at the same time using a shit ton of plastic and am also keen on soil, not hydroponics for numerous reasons. I do like aquaponics and more farming fish in general because fish are cold blooded and therefore convert feed more efficiently (no homeostasis making energy demands).

I feel like there should be a lot more Urban Agriculture (mostly horticulture). There are numerous papers to suggest that this has benefits in a few areas: most of the work is done manually, so actually yield per acre is higher than out of town systems and farm in a direction they are unable to: up (ie climbing beans, peas etc, which would not be combinable unlike dwarf peas), fresh food availability in "food deserts" and apparently lots of social benefits (people seem to enjoy it). You can, of course integrate some (limited) livestock in this to eat waste etc.

Livestock integration and/or more effective grazing elsewhere would also be useful. We already know that your yield per acre (of grass and by extension, meat) goes up if you use mob/cell grazing, but this also benefits soil and wildlife: Cell grazing supports double the livestock per hectare of set-stocking and delivers environmental benefits | Rothamsted Research

I think the systems that most need looking at are going to be intensive pig and poultry - sadly, these sectors make up 80% of the meat we eat and so this will be quite a transition. These two animals can be integrated into other systems but at nothing like the volume, so expect pork and chicken to be rarer and therefore more expensive.

Also, to me the only "fair" production based subsidy is guaranteed prices. This takes the risk out of production (eg, if you decide to produce a beef animal, that is almost three years commitment), but still enables you to farm without distorting your system (eg when headage payments were a thing, farmers would keep lots more animals and just buy in feed, which is basically exporting some of their production elsewhere).


How we'd get to this stage, I have no idea. Not many people, let alone politicians understand farming and of those who do, loads are old and set in their ways (average age of a farmer is 60 odd).

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I'm not mad keen on vertical farming in that sense, it always seems to claim to be "environmentally friendly" whilst at the same time using a shit ton of plastic and am also keen on soil, not hydroponics for numerous reasons. I do like aquaponics and more farming fish in general because fish are cold blooded and therefore convert feed more efficiently (no homeostasis making energy demands).

I feel like there should be a lot more Urban Agriculture (mostly horticulture). There are numerous papers to suggest that this has benefits in a few areas: most of the work is done manually, so actually yield per acre is higher than out of town systems and farm in a direction they are unable to: up (ie climbing beans, peas etc, which would not be combinable unlike dwarf peas), fresh food availability in "food deserts" and apparently lots of social benefits (people seem to enjoy it). You can, of course integrate some (limited) livestock in this to eat waste etc.

Livestock integration and/or more effective grazing elsewhere would also be useful. We already know that your yield per acre (of grass and by extension, meat) goes up if you use mob/cell grazing, but this also benefits soil and wildlife: Cell grazing supports double the livestock per hectare of set-stocking and delivers environmental benefits | Rothamsted Research

I think the systems that most need looking at are going to be intensive pig and poultry - sadly, these sectors make up 80% of the meat we eat and so this will be quite a transition. These two animals can be integrated into other systems but at nothing like the volume, so expect pork and chicken to be rarer and therefore more expensive.

Also, to me the only "fair" production based subsidy is guaranteed prices. This takes the risk out of production (eg, if you decide to produce a beef animal, that is almost three years commitment), but still enables you to farm without distorting your system (eg when headage payments were a thing, farmers would keep lots more animals and just buy in feed, which is basically exporting some of their production elsewhere).


How we'd get to this stage, I have no idea. Not many people, let alone politicians understand farming and of those who do, loads are old and set in their ways (average age of a farmer is 60 odd).

I've long thought that I would love to be able to work maybe one or two days a week, or a set number of days a year probably, on an urban farm. Perhaps something with a full-time farm manager and then staff of enthusiastic part-timers like me. I'm in no way green-fingered so I'd need to be told what to do.

Turn urban golf courses into urban farms. And give incentives to people to do it. Aside from the food production element, I think loads of people would benefit from a day or two shovelling shit or whatever else they're asked to do. Just doing one job all week is a bit rubbish really.

There are various problems with many kinds of fish farms, no? From welfare issues to meat quality issues to where you get the feed from issues to pollution issues to infection issues. Mussel and oyster farms, yes, lots more of those. And snail farms. And grasshopper farms.

 

[tim]

There's nothing stopping you, as long as you don't mind not getting paid.

Volunteer with Us | Mudchute Park and Farm

www.mudchute.org

 

[Funky_monks]

I've long thought that I would love to be able to work maybe one or two days a week, or a set number of days a year probably, on an urban farm. Perhaps something with a full-time farm manager and then staff of enthusiastic part-timers like me. I'm in no way green-fingered so I'd need to be told what to do.

Turn urban golf courses into urban farms. And give incentives to people to do it. Aside from the food production element, I think loads of people would benefit from a day or two shovelling shit or whatever else they're asked to do. Just doing one job all week is a bit rubbish really.

There are various problems with many kinds of fish farms, no? From welfare issues to meat quality issues to where you get the feed from issues to pollution issues to infection issues. Mussel and oyster farms, yes, lots more of those. And snail farms. And grasshopper farms.

I used to manage a trout farm and mostly these have to do with the types of fish farmed - Salmonids are very temperamental, requite very clean, cold, well oxygenated water and a high fishmeal based diet as are carnivorous. Utterly unsuitable for culture, really.

The OG farmed freshwater fish in Europe (and Asia) is the carp. They were brought over to feed monks - they will grow in a muddy puddle and will convert lots of things to protein, in some Asian systems they just fertilise ponds with cattle muck and the carp feed off the resulting plankton. You could subsitute Tilapia or Pangassius in tropical or subtropical systems. There's evidence of mullet farming in marine systems going back millennia - trap the fish in a tidal fish trap, feed them on (they have gut flora so can consume a lot of algae/plant matter) and net them out.

To add: Fuck Golf courses (although they do grow both magic mushrooms and tasty rabbits.....)

 

[Funky_monks]

There's nothing stopping you, as long as you don't mind not getting paid.

Volunteer with Us | Mudchute Park and Farm

www.mudchute.org

One of the papers I read talks about this - they seem to increase social cohesion, especially in situations where people are still moving from the land into the cities, it can form links between immigrant and native populations.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

There's nothing stopping you, as long as you don't mind not getting paid.

Volunteer with Us | Mudchute Park and Farm

www.mudchute.org

That looks like a good thing. Not quite what I was thinking of, though. I'm not sure it actually produces anything, does it? More zoo than farm.

I'd be ok with not being paid if I got a share of the produce. That's more what I was thinking of - actual working farms that are operated on a part-share basis.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I used to manage a trout farm and mostly these have to do with the types of fish farmed - Salmonids are very temperamental, requite very clean, cold, well oxygenated water and a high fishmeal based diet as are carnivorous. Utterly unsuitable for culture, really.

The OG farmed freshwater fish in Europe (and Asia) is the carp. They were brought over to feed monks - they will grow in a muddy puddle and will convert lots of things to protein, in some Asian systems they just fertilise ponds with cattle muck and the carp feed off the resulting plankton. You could subsitute Tilapia or Pangassius in tropical or subtropical systems. There's evidence of mullet farming in marine systems going back millennia - trap the fish in a tidal fish trap, feed them on (they have gut flora so can consume a lot of algae/plant matter) and net them out.

To add: Fuck Golf courses (although they do grow both magic mushrooms and tasty rabbits.....)

Yeah, I was thinking of salmon. And catfish in the Mekong is an environmental disaster unfortunately. It's appeared here recently marketed as basa, but it's in no way sustainable.

 

[tim]

That looks like a good thing. Not quite what I was thinking of, though. I'm not sure it actually produces anything, does it? More zoo than farm.

I'd be ok with not being paid if I got a share of the produce. That's more what I was thinking of - actual working farms that are operated on a part-share basis.

Educational resource with cute but edible byproducts

 

[Funky_monks]

Yeah, I was thinking of salmon. And catfish in the Mekong is an environmental disaster unfortunately. It's appeared here recently marketed as basa, but it's in no way sustainable.

That's Pangassius and it can be farmed in a sustainable way, just depends on system - will eat almost anything and convert it into protein.

 

[Funky_monks]

That looks like a good thing. Not quite what I was thinking of, though. I'm not sure it actually produces anything, does it? More zoo than farm.

I'd be ok with not being paid if I got a share of the produce. That's more what I was thinking of - actual working farms that are operated on a part-share basis.

I went to one in Brixton when I was last in London (I think I was being placated - was taken there and to Smithfield as a "break" from theatre and art galleries). I liked it, but I didn't think much of their livestock, or rather, how it didn't really integrate and was mostly there as an attraction (but maybe that's important to get people to engage). Would have been far more useful producing veg, generally.

 

[tim]

That's Pangassius and it can be farmed in a sustainable way, just depends on system - will eat almost anything and convert it into protein.

And what does it taste like?

 

[littlebabyjesus]

And what does it taste like?

Tastes good. It's a meaty white fish.

I was eating it until I read up on catfish farming in the Mekong, where it comes from. It's not great. Massive problems with eutrophication. As ever, overexploitation.

 

[Funky_monks]

And what does it taste like?

Its okay, firm, can be a bit muddy. Is nice in stir fries etc where freshness (ginger, green chilli, spring onions etc) lift it a bit.

 

[gosub]

That's something I could get behind. £1k/acre/year for any land left unused for two years or more. Five years and the land is taken from you and and put into public ownership.

You factoring crop rotation fallow years into that or just turning land to dust in the name of green eye?

 

[Funky_monks]

That's something I could get behind. £1k/acre/year for any land left unused for two years or more. Five years and the land is taken from you and and put into public ownership.

This reminds me of a discussion among my students (50% of whom are from a farming background) that took place a few years back. Somebody said that (and I've never bothered to find out if this is true or not, but it made for a good discussion point) that in China, all similar (eg Dairy) farms were benchmarked and government had access to the figures and if you were in the bottom 20% more than one year running your farm was compulsorily purchased and someone else was invited to take over.

Lots agreed that this was a good idea.

 

[gosub]

This reminds me of a discussion among my students (50% of whom are from a farming background) that took place a few years back. Somebody said that (and I've never bothered to find out if this is true or not, but it made for a good discussion point) that in China, all similar (eg Dairy) farms were benchmarked and government had access to the figures and if you were in the bottom 20% more than one year running your farm was compulsorily purchased and someone else was invited to take over.

Lots agreed that this was a good idea.

Swine flu (which lead to Truss getting excited about Chinese pork markets) wiped out loads of Chinese farmers. They gave a different load of people the chance to learn for themselves how shit swine flu is rather than helping out the farmers that lost everything but had gained in experience doing so

 

[xenon]

What do we think about George Monbiot's claim that basically we need to stop farming as it's recognised today, altogether?

I know this is a well lazy question, I've not read his book. Just heard him on a podcast recently. It seems a bit of an ask, vegeterianism or no...

 

[littlebabyjesus]

What do we think about George Monbiot's claim that basically we need to stop farming as it's recognised today, altogether?

I know this is a well lazy question, I've not read his book. Just heard him on a podcast recently. It seems a bit of an ask, vegeterianism or no...

Lots of hand-waving about high-tech uber-processed 'plant-based' protein. Not so much detail about where the inputs come from, how it scales up, or indeed how you get people across the world to buy into it. Also a bit vague on how the rewilding bit can actually work in practice.

My biggest criticism of this kind of vision of the future is the way that it treats humans as an alienated 'other', as not part of the environment or ecosystems at all. 'Wild' defined as 'absence of humans'. It does have a tendency to treat us as something either special and godlike or irredemably unfit to exist within any system. It's quite a pessimistic view of existence, although I'm sure Monbiot doesn't see it like that.

 

[xenon]

Lots of hand-waving about high-tech uber-processed 'plant-based' protein. Not so much detail about where the inputs come from, how it scales up, or indeed how you get people across the world to buy into it. Also a bit vague on how the rewilding bit can actually work in practice.

My biggest criticism of this kind of vision of the future is the way that it treats humans as an alienated 'other', as not part of the environment or ecosystems at all. 'Wild' defined as 'absence of humans'. It does have a tendency to treat us as something either special and godlike or irredemably unfit to exist within any system. It's quite a pessimistic view of existence, although I'm sure Monbiot doesn't see it like that.

Thanks. I know some of this is covered in that mega thread but I'm just having an evening of idlely wondering about a few things. Have just read this which echoes some of what you mention.

More extreme claims from George Monbiot: The Sustainable Food Trust responds | Sustainable Food Trust

On 16 August, The Guardian published ‘The most damaging farm products? Organic, pasture-fed beef and lamb’, an article by George Monbiot. The piece consists of points from Monbiot’s recent book, Regenesis: Feeding the world without devouring the planet, which the SFT has already reviewed. We...

sustainablefoodtrust.org

 

[Funky_monks]

What do we think about George Monbiot's claim that basically we need to stop farming as it's recognised today, altogether?

I know this is a well lazy question, I've not read his book. Just heard him on a podcast recently. It seems a bit of an ask, vegeterianism or no...

Bollocks, and dangerous bollocks at that, since he seems to have influence (he is, after all a public school educated son of a Tory MP and councillor who went to Oxford).

There have been other books written about how he loves cherry-picking science.

Rewilding the UK just means we export our food production to the developing world, which is a travesty given how productive our soils can be.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

When Monbiot talks about other topics, such as empire and its legacy, for example, he actually talks a lot of sense. Ironically, it is in his chosen specialist subject that he talks a load of bollocks.

 

[brogdale]

Bollocks, and dangerous bollocks at that, since he seems to have influence (he is, after all a public school educated son of a Tory MP and councillor who went to Oxford).

There have been other books written about how he loves cherry-picking science.

Rewilding the UK just means we export our food production to the developing world, which is a travesty given how productive our soils can be.

Really?
Surely reducing aggregate average meat consumption would allow significant agricultural de-intensification ?

 

[newme]

Really?
Surely reducing aggregate average meat consumption would allow significant agricultural de-intensification ?

Sure go grow wheat on somewhere that barely supports goats, hope the combine doesn't fall off

 

[brogdale]

Sure go grow wheat on somewhere that barely supports goats, hope the combine doesn't fall off

No need to stop milking the goats, surely?

 

[newme]

No need to stop milking the goats, surely?

What goats if you have to grow something else?

 

[Saul Goodman]

You factoring crop rotation fallow years into that or just turning land to dust in the name of green eye?

The clue was in the " any land left unused for two years or more" bit, which allows a year fallow and an extra year to decide what you want to plant there.

 

[Saul Goodman]

Really?
Surely reducing aggregate average meat consumption would allow significant agricultural de-intensification ?

No, it'd be worse. Only 1/3 of agricultural land in the UK is arable. The rest is only fit for growing animals. It's a little fact a lot of people seem to overlook.

 

[Elpenor]

Spoke to a mate tonight who’s worked on farms and grew up on one. His view (probably a voter for Starmer’s Labour but probably voted for Cameron and perhaps Johnson for context) was that a farmers claimed £10k of profit is a falsehood, that’s after paying themselves a salary plus a lot of other deductibles

Eg their Range Rover goes through the business, if it has a personalised plate this is an asset of the business too etc

Also when I go to my local rugby club, I’ve seen a few people who have season tickets which are in the name of say Bridge Farm rather than John Smith, so tied to a business. Again this is something that the farmer probably uses for themselves for personal reasons but can put through the business.

So basically virtually everything is going through their business, so reducing taxable income, also in a family farm probably no housing costs either.

 

[iona]

I've long thought that I would love to be able to work maybe one or two days a week, or a set number of days a year probably, on an urban farm. Perhaps something with a full-time farm manager and then staff of enthusiastic part-timers like me. I'm in no way green-fingered so I'd need to be told what to do.

I'd be ok with not being paid if I got a share of the produce. That's more what I was thinking of - actual working farms that are operated on a part-share basis.

Some CSA (community supported agriculture) projects work more or less like this, although it's common for the work to either be entirely voluntary or in exchange for something like a reduced rate for their veg box subscription. I've worked for more rural ones but they exist in cities too.